Tag: creating
Creative Mondays #027 – Nervous? Just do it.
Recently I received a scheduling for a puppet audition through The Jim Henson Company. When I was first called about it, I was initially pretty confident I could go in there and nail it. Then, I received the script and all the information about the audition and I was even MORE confident I could go in their an nail it. The character was something I could hit out of the part really easily, the script was funny (something I usually find is quite rare in these situations) and it would just be a tremendously fun project to work on.
Then, just a few days before the audition, I found out something that rattled my confidence completely. Just completely dashed that sense of ‘I got this” completely. The good old Negative Brain took full control. In one instant, I went from confident to a complete mess. “I got this” became, “Not in a million years.” In fact, my negative brain, as if does, started telling me, “Just don’t even do it. That way you won’t be disappointed when you don’t get it.”
Now, my negative brain is not strong enough for me to make majorly stupid mistakes. I completely understand the consequences of not showing up to an audition that The Jim Henson Company has scheduled you for. So, there was no way I was going to NOT go to the audition.
I began thinking about being nervous about something big in your creative career and how it can completely play with your mind. In situations like that you have two choices. Don’t do it, as your negative brain would have you and play it safe. Or, as the old Nike ad says, “just do it.” And really, there is no choice. Just do it.
Nerves are nothing. They are just a holdover from that primitive brain we’ve talked about before on here. They are there to keep you safe. But when you think about things logically you’ll see that nerves can sometimes misguide you.
Being nervous while swimming in shark infested waters is probably a good idea. You could die.
Being nervous when going into an audition, or unveiling your recent painting, or stepping out on stage to play a new song, recite a new poem, read a new story, etc., those things re not likely to kill you. You’ll be just fine. Sure, you may blow the audition, receive criticism, get booed, but is it going to kill you? Probably not. And in the unlikely event that those things happen (how many people really get booed anymore?) they will all be incredible learning experiences of what to do or not do the next time you are in one of those situations.
So, when it came to this audition of mine, there really was only one choice, do it. I studied the script harder than anything I had recently. I worked on my puppetry even more to be spot on when I went in. Part of the audition would be riffing/improv so I thought of things I may say in different situations that may pop up. I made myself completely ready for this audition.
Was I still nervous? Yes.
Was I going to let that nervousness stop me? No way.
Will I get the part? Who knows? But I’m more likely to get it now that I didn’t chicken out and not go to the audition.
If you are nervous about something, just do it.
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How do you deal with being nervous about big events in your creative life? Has the nervousness ever won out? Or did you battle is successfully?
Creative Mondays #024 – Don’t be precious (a lesson from Gonzo The Great)
This is one of those rules on creativity that people talk about a lot. When you are creating something, especially something you are creating with other people, you cannot be precious with your ideas. Some of them will get used, some of them will not get used. You must know this going in otherwise you’ll be setting yourself up for misery.
This rule struck me one time when I watched it happen right in front of me. In 2003, I was lucky enough to be invited to hang out on the set of a Muppet commercial shoot. It was the Dominoes Pizza Super Bowl ads that they were in. For two days I just sat, like a fly on the wall, and watched as the people behind the Muppets worked their magic. As a side note here, my favorite Muppet is Gonzo, so I kept a close eye on what Dave Goelz, Gonzo’s performer, was doing.
During one break I noticed Dave was over near the Puppet Wrangler’s table working on something. He had some items from the Craft Service table, a long puppet rod and some tools and was busily building something. Someone asked what it was and he said he felt lil Gonzo should be doing something in the background of the next shot they were filming, so he was building a stack of food for Gonzo to balance on his finger. The rig would have made it appear like Gonzo was balancing a peanut on his fingertip, then balanced on that, a soda can, and then a bag of chips and so on. It was really a great looking rig and it was built out of actual stuff! He drilled holes in a REAL peanut in order to slide the rod through.
I’d say he spent about a good thirty minutes of his lunch break on this neat little addition to the commercial. When he was done he tried it out and the effect was hilarious, it looked like Gonzo was balancing all this stuff on his finger. Everybody loved it. They tested it out on camera and it looked great. But then, somebody decided that it just wasn’t right for the scene. The Muppets mantra has always been, “Pull Focus” but this gag was pulling a little too much focus. Ultimately, the decision was made not to use it. I guess in a commercial you don’t want to pull too much focus away from the product you’re actually selling.
So, after working so hard on this little piece of puppetry fun, what did Dave Goelz do? He just tossed it aside with a smile and got ready for the next shot. His attitude was one of, “Well, that would have been fun but, oh well, no big deal.” Now, he could have been upset or fought for it or thrown a big-time hollywood star tantrum, but he didn’t. He moved on to the next order of business with a smile.
Seeing this happen really struck me. Something you work hard on, no matter how good of an idea it is, may not make the final project. This happens all the time when creating things with others and it can happen in working on your own stuff as well. A particular exchange of dialogue in your writing may be the best you’ve ever written, but if if doesn’t work with the story, you have to toss it. You can be upset for a moment, but then you have to move on with your creating.
This is a tough one. Usually us artists go from thinking everything we do is crap to everything we do is good. Sometimes, even when you know you have something good, you have to let it go if it’s not working.
Take a lesson from Gonzo: you can’t be precious with your work.
What Others Are Creating #001
I want this blog to not just be about my stories and stuff that I’m creating. I want to show off some other great creative work as well.. I truly do enjoy seeing the other creative projects that people are working on. So, the other day, I put out a call on Twitter for links to projects others were working on. Things that they are creating for themselves. Below is a list of those who replied as well as some creative goodies from others that I’ve been impressed with this week.
STV MEDIA STUDIOS – http://www.stvmediastudios.com/home.html – Connor Asher is an aspiring puppeteer whom I’ve had the pleasure of meeting a few times while out on Puppet Up! Uncensored tours. Actually, I shouldn’t say he is an ‘aspiring’ puppeteer. He’s a darn good puppeteer and he is not waiting for anyone to tell him what he can and cannot do. He’s creating a media empire on his own and I fully suspect I’ll be sending him a resume someday for a job on one of his projects.
Randall C. Willis – http://createdbyrcw.com – Randall is another creative type who I was lucky enough to meet in Toronto while performing in Puppet Up! – Uncensored. He’s a great guy and his website is full of short stories, essays and photographs he has taken. Check out his pictures from his walk around Vanderbuilt University or his piece called Music and the soul. Really touching.
Kristin Hogan – https://www.etsy.com/shop/SquidFriends – Kristin Hogan is yet another crdtive dynamo I met while doing Puppet Up!. She is an artist in many mediums but making stuffed squids is her passion and they are pretty amazing. She will be at Dallas Comic-Con next weekend, so if you’re in the area, check it out. Kristin also penned a really great piece about copycats on her tumblr. It has inspired another Creative Mondays post as it’s something I’m dealing with now as well. Give it a read, really great food for thought – http://squidfriends.tumblr.com/post/85026374907/a-word-on-copycats-vs-other-people-inspired-by-the-same
Goon Holler General Store – http://www.goonhollergeneralstore.com – One of the really incredible things that has come out of my use of the social media app Vine is meeting Parker Jacobs. We share a lot of the same creative influences and creative spirit and he, like me, seems intent on creating good quality family fun. If you’ve watched Yo Gabba Gabba! Or The Aquabats! Super show! You’ve seen his art (and possibly his creation Tooba, the sasquatch.) He recently opened up a website to sell some of the items bearing his unique art (and I’m proud to say I was order #27 through his store)! Go peruse what he has to offer. I can highly recommend his book The Goon Holler Guidebook and who wouldn’t want their own Tooba pillow?!
Prednisone By Carla Ulbrich – http://youtu.be/WE1rmToYWyY – My good friend, and incredibly talented singer/songwriter, Carla Ulbrich checks in with this great lyric video of her ‘hit’ Prednisone. Give it a listen. You’ll be singing it all day.
The 33 by J.C. Hutchins – http://jchutchins.net/the-33 – My podcast pal, J.C. Hutchins, is in the middle of telling a great podcast story called The 33. J.C. Calls it ‘TV for your e-reader’ and I would whole heartedly agree. It’s not for kids, but if you like a goos sci-fi, supernatural thriller, you should check it out. You can even get a sample of it for free. It’s good stuff.
So check out one or all of these projects. Who knows, perhaps you’ll find your new piece of inspiration in one of these. And I’d love to make this a regular feature, so if you have a piece of creative work that’s online, tell me about it in the comments below and I’ll check it out!
Have a great weekend!
Creative Mondays #018 – The right people will get this.
“The right people will get this.”
This one one of my all time favorite quotes. It is a quote by Joel Hodgson, creator of Mystery Science Theatre 3000 and Cinematic Titanic. If you have followed my blog or Twitter feed or whatever, you have no doubt read it before. Joel was said it in response if someone asked him if he worried that some people may not get all the jokes on Mystery Science Theatre 3000. His response was, “We never ask, ‘Who’s gonna get this?’ We always say, ‘The right people will get this’.”
To me this statement boils down to not trying to create art for a specific audience. Create art that is wholly and truly for you and it will find an audience. This is what I’ve tried to do in the art I create.
When I came up with the idea of The Radio Adventures of Dr. Floyd based on characters that Doug and I had created, I never had an audience in mind outside of the idea pleased me. I don’t even think at the beginning Doug was all to sure why I wanted to create a silly little radio show based on these characters. But once we got going he got on board full force and the show soon became something that in it’s base elements, just made the two of us laugh. This is how we made the show and the show found an audience.
I will say that we did make a small change in how we wrote the show at the very beginning with the audince in mind. In the beginning we were fine with double entendre. In the Wright Brothers episode the joke was that the Wright Brothers wanted to invent the plane because they were secretly peanut farmers and if they invented the plane, they would required peanuts be served on every flight. One of the Brothers had the line, “Someday the world will know the wonders of our nuts.” (A tip of the hat to the line in the Ren & Stimpy Show’s Rubber Nipple Salesmen episode.) We found this funny, but once we began podcasting and we received emails from families saying how much their kids loved the show we thought twice about doing jokes like that. Other than that though, we did a show that made us laugh.
When ‘Hollywood’ stared calling us talking about the possibility of turning it into a TV show, one of the first questions we would be asked is, “What’s the demographic?” This was so hard to answer because we never, ever, thought about it. We would say it’s a kids’ show or a family show, but we’d never have a specific demographic in mind and that’s what Hollywood wants. A specific demographic. We would say, “Our demographic is everybody.” Because we’d get phone calls from people ages 3 to 80. But Hollywood wanted a specific age range. Did THe Muppet Show have a demographic when it was pitched? If so, I’d say that’s the demographic. Everybody.
With Dr. Floyd, the right people ‘got us.’ They got our sense of humor, our references, our jokes and for a little radio show that was recorded, mostly, in the living room of my tiny, one bedroom apartment, we did pretty good.
So create art that excites you and put it out there. The right audience will find you.